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A couple of years ago, former Eidos designer Antonio Ciongoli and Stoffa founder Agyesh Madan headed to India to work on a collaboration. They developed two hand-dyed indigo fabrics – one shirting weight, the other trouser weight – and came up with a hand-block pattern for some prints. Unfortunately, the collaboration never came to fruition. Eidos’ parent company, Isaia, wasn’t sure how the market would react to unstable dyes (in contrast to synthetic dyes, natural dyes fade and run easily). Like Brooks Brothers’ customers in 1959, who angrily stormed back into the stores and complained about how their madras shirts were bleeding in the wash, they worried that people would mistake the character of natural dyes as defects. 

The work wasn’t all lost, however. Madan eventually used part of that trip for a Drake’s collaboration, and Ciongoli used it as inspiration for a new line. Since stepping down as Creative Director at Eidos – which is now run by Simon Spurr – Ciongoli has started 18 East, a new menswear apparel brand under Roller Rabbit. The line is debuting tonight at New York City’s 180 the Store. 

18 East isn’t necessarily a travel line, but it’s about traveling. The number 18 refers to how R is the 18th letter of the alphabet (a nod to their parent company, Roller Rabbit), and East is an allusion to Eastern manufacturing. “Everything we make is with small, artisanal suppliers,” Ciongoli explains. “When people talk about handwork, they’re often talking about how someone is operating a machine by hand. But handwork here means real handwork – even the embroideries are done purely by hand.” 

In 1936, the editors of Apparel Arts published “Permanent Modern,” a fourteen-page article introducing their vision for the ideal menswear store. The article spares little in details. Included are elaborate floor plans and descriptions of the materials that should be used for the architecture, fixtures, and display cases. According to the editors, things should look modern, but not “voguish modern,” as you want to catch the customer’s eye, yet also make the place feel inviting. They even specified the lighting and air conditioning systems (two whole pages were dedicated to that). Should the reader want to implement their vision, they included a directory for the contractors, suppliers, and equipment manufacturers who could help with the store’s construction.

The store they imagined was grand – something like a Saks Fifth Avenue, but solely dedicated to men. There were five retail floors, each dedicated to a certain class of items. On the first floor, you had accessories and footwear. Moving up, there were sport, prep, and university clothes; then high-end tailoring; and finally moderately priced attire and boy’s clothing. The basement floor was to be a club lounge with fruitwood furniture and a fully stocked bar. And at the top-most floor, there would be a penthouse restaurant with an open-air dining terrace. Apparel Arts’ editors imagined that the terrace could be converted into a skating rink in the wintertime, which could also double as a stage for showing clothes on live models. 

It’s hard for me to imagine going without a pair of sneakers this time of year. Summer is about having the windows down and volume up, biking somewhere on a hot afternoon, and hanging your feet off a picnic bench while BBQ-ing with friends. Camp moccasins and penny loafers can be great for these sorts of things, but I also like having a pair of casual sneakers you can wear with jeans and camp collar shirts. 

I’ve cycled through a bunch over the years, but find I keep returning to the same ones (although, the first pair below were recently acquired). If you’re looking to get a pair this summer, here are some of my favorites. Since they’re mostly designer shoes based off classic silhouettes, I’ve included links to the originals, which are much more affordable. As sneakers go, the build quality between the low and high end of the spectrum is smaller than it is in dress shoes – almost everything is in design. I like the uniqueness of these versions, but their designers found the originals to be inspiring for a reason. 

Visvim Bamboo Skagways

To understand male fashion today, you have to go back to The Great Masculine Renunciation. Somewhere around the time of Beau Brummell and The French Revolution, European elites traded their sumptuous garb for utilitarian clothes that underscored their commitment to work over aesthetics. Ornate fashion was for women, not “serious men” focused on living out a life of the mind. The difference between these two eras couldn’t be starker. Just compare how extravagantly King Louis XIV dressed to the sobriety of President Macron.

This split in history, which divides men’s dress like the BC and AD periods of the Gregorian calendar, explains our attitudes towards male jewelry. Jewelry has a strange place in the world of men’s accessories. Scarves, gloves, and wristwatches are acceptable because of their utility; pocket squares and neckties are OK for no other reason than tradition. But once you get beyond a modest wedding band, the idea of a man wearing something ornate, expensive, and metal seems tacky. They offend a certain sensibility we find difficult to pinpoint or even justify, but nonetheless stand by. 

After the Second World War, jewelry has come in and out of fashion depending on how we feel about gender and class. In the 1970s, when it was socially acceptable for men to show a more feminine side, hippies and counter-culture types wore bracelets and necklaces; high-flying business elites wore flat links with pinstriped suits in the ‘80s; and surfers have been known to use Saint Christopher medallions as good luck charms. Throughout these periods, many men have worn jewelry well – even magnificently. Like others in the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes occasionally wore a silver onyx ring to show a bit of personality. Marlon Brando, James Dean, and Paul Newman sported chunky, silver ID bracelets with jeans and t-shirts. And Yves Saint Laurent, one of the chicest to ever wear a suit, accessorized with a precious metal bracelet. 

Most books on men’s tailoring aren’t very good. Many recycle the same Wikipedia entries, or they do little more than serve as PR mouthpieces for a company. Sometimes they have a few good photos, but they’re the sorts of things you look at once and never remember. Rare is a book like Lance Richardson’s House of Nutter, which is one of the best books on Savile Row I’ve read in years.

House of Nutter is about the life and times of Tommy Nutter, a Savile Row salesman who created one of the most important tailoring houses in the post-war era. During the ‘60s, most of Savile Row specialized in staid and conservative suits, often following old traditions. Nutter, who originally worked the front of house at Donaldson, Williamson & Ward, wanted something more daring – something bolder. And he was able to turn that dream into a reality through Edward Sexton, the technical genius behind the curtain. Together, they made a look that defined the 1970s. Their house style was full-bodied and long, with a leafy silhouette, strong shoulders, and lapels so enormous, they nearly grazed the sleeveheads. Edges were sometimes taped; patch pockets cut on a bias. Mick Jagger, John Lennon, and Elton John – among many other celebs – wore their bombastic creations, and the tailoring continues to inspire designers today. 

Richardson’s book is great because it captures all of the romance of the clothes, as well as the bespoke process, without falling for the naive illusions common among laypeople (or, frankly, most fashion writers). It doesn’t get misty-eyed about bespoke tailoring, but also doesn’t feel cynical or technically sterile. Most of all, Richardson’s book is about the very thing that give clothes life – culture. This is a book about rock ‘n roll, the gay London scene during the 1970s, and even AIDS epidemic (which ultimately took Tommy Nutter’s life). An excerpt from the preface:

“Want to know if a man is well dressed? Look down.” So wrote George Frazier, author of The Art of Wearing Clothes, a 1960s Esquire article considered by many to be the best thing ever written on men’s style. Yet, while the market for custom clothing grows each year, it’s rare to see custom footwear (rumors are even swirling about one of the more prestigious firms being on the brink of bankruptcy). For men who get custom suits and sport coats, shoes are the last part of their wardrobe that gets rebuilt. In his book Acquired Tastes, Peter Mayle suggests it’s because bespoke shoes smack of excess, “more shameful than a passion for cashmere socks.” He wrote: “Unlike the miracles of disguise that a tailor has perform in order to camouflage bodily imperfections, the shoemaker’s task is simple. Feet are feet.” 

I think he’s right, to a degree. As they say, God makes and the tailor shapes. It takes a skilled tailor to transform a two-dimensional piece of fabric into a three-dimensional form entirely different than your body (thankfully). Shoes, on the other hand, cocoon your feet like hard shells. So long as they don’t cut into your ankles, or fall off your feet, you’re fine. Aldens, for example, are built like empty Kleenex boxes. That’s partly why they’re so comfortable. 

The benefits of moving from ready-to-wear to custom for footwear aren’t the same as they are for tailored clothing, but they exist. For one, a custom shoemaker can shape the shoes in a way that’s a bit sleeker and more refined than what you’ll find in stores. The waist can hug your arches better; the toe box slimmed in a way that’s flattering, while remaining comfortable. Simon Crompton has written about this before. And if you care about craft for its own sake – the only justifiable reason for these prices, I think – then there’s no real comparison. 

The loss of the coat-and-tie uniform in the last fifty years has meant more than the loss of formality. It’s made it harder for men to know how to dress. The brilliance of traditional tailoring is that anyone can look good in a suit – provided you have a reliable tailor and are willing to follow some simple rules. But as dress codes have broken down and people everywhere are dressing more casually, it’s become harder and harder to wear tailored clothing. The New York Times tells us that we live in a more liberated world where people can dress however they want – swapping clothes in and out as freely as their emotions swing – but I’ve argued that things are nearly just as constrictive as they were in the 1960s. It’s just that instead of hard written dress codes, we have softly coded dress norms – things that define how men should dress, but are never spoken of and can only be understood through inference. 

I think this is why so many men have a hard time figuring out what they want to wear. They find suits and sport coats too formal; Americana and workwear too rugged; designers such as Dries and Margiela too avant-garde. Yet, they also know that an oxford button-down worn alone with flat front chinos lacks verve. Casualwear can be frustrating because it’s nebulous – it’s more about dressing according to emotions, rather than rules, and a lot depends on your personality and lifestyle. 

In the last few years, however, I’ve noticed a new space emerge for guys who want a more casual version of classic style. I think of it as reinvented Italian sportswear. Think of Stoffa’s made-to-measure bomber jackets, which are designed to be worn with tailored trousers in lieu of a sport coat. Or Eidos’ range of textured Arans with interesting necklines, unconstructed topcoats, and lounge-y cardigans. Similarly, Camoshita has remixed Italian style and Ivy classics for men who want something contemporary, refined, and smart. 

One of the things I love about Drake’s is how they’re able to present classic clothes in a way that feels a bit fresher, a bit newer, without veering off into the bushes. This season, the company shot their spring/ summer lookbook in Charleston, South Carolina, where they’ve mixed their English ties and Italian tailoring with some of their favorite pieces from the heydays of American style. And at a time when prep feels beleaguered – sometimes dated, sometimes lacking in self awareness – Drake’s presentation makes me think, “oh yea, this stuff is pretty good.”

In an old post at Put This On, my friend Pete once wrote a great essay on what’s happened to prep. In the mid-2000s, “J. Crew sales were booming – critter shorts and tiny collared OCBDs abounded. Grosgrain enthusiast Thom Browne won a CFDA award and got his own line at Brooks Brothers. Ralph Lauren launched an over-the-top youthful prep brand allegedly named after Ralph’s dog, Rugby. Old prep labels such as Gant were resurrected, and Barneys stocked new, prep-riffing labels like Band of Outsiders and Benjamin Bixby. The author of the Official Preppy Handbook was writing a sequel.” 

Now in 2018, Rugby and Bixby have shuttered, Thom Browne is no longer at Brooks Brothers, and J. Crew and Ralph Lauren are struggling to find their footing. Even the term preppy feels pejorative again. It’s sticky and gross, referencing a sense of smugness, as well as the squeamishly elitist things we blissfully ignored ten years ago. Pete writes: “Prep implies privilege and inherited money; some of prep’s charm comes from the unquestioning self-confidence bestowed only by independent wealth. Today we still like our wealth obnoxious. But not smug or entitled.” To the degree prep feels relevant, it’s often through generic things that have simply become “clothes.” Flat front used to be preppy, but now they’re just common attire for everyday office workers. 

Is it possible to be this excited about socks? Ten years ago, garishly designed “fun socks” were a mark of bad taste – like the hosiery equivalent of novelty ties. For years, I’ve stuck to solid-colored navy dress socks and simple, gray, athletic cotton-socks out of fear of seeming too whimsical. Too many suits in the late-aughts were ruined by screamy colors peeking out from beneath the cuffs; too many casual outfits accessorized with something that said “bacon” or “beer.”

In the last couple of years, however, I’ve opened up to the idea that socks can be fun, but still in good taste – socks don’t have to be so pedestrian. I really like Anonymous Ism’s socks, for example, which can be cheerful without being contrived. Wigwam has terrifically slubby camp socks. Chup has some of the best Fair Isles. Last month, I also picked up a couple of pairs of American Trench’s wool-silk boot socks, which are subtly flecked like Donegal tweed. And they may just be my favorites of all.

American Trench is one of the many young companies today promoting American manufacturing. They started as a Kickstarter campaign for contemporary styled, single-breasted raincoats. “We didn’t want to offer early supporters branded t-shirts, so we made a small line of socks,” says Jacob Hurwitz, the company’s founder and designer. “Since our launch, that part of the business has really grown, especially on the wholesale side. About 80% of our sales volume now is made up of accessories, such as socks, hats, gloves, and scarves.”